This impossibility of negotiating with Rome rendered necessary an indirect method of accomplishing his desire to abolish confiscation, which he recognized as a serious impediment to commercial credit and prosperity, especially through the sequestration of property at arrest. As it was provided by the canons it could only be abrogated by a papal rescript, and to evade this difficulty, in his decree of February 6, 1649, he disclaimed all intention of interfering with the functions of the Holy Office, which should continue to include confiscation in its sentences but, after this declaration, he made to the culprits a free gift of their forfeited property, which they could dispose of at will, provided it was in favor of Catholics, and he also abolished sequestration at arrest. But this was not only a free gift but a binding contract, under which the merchants engaged to form a trading company to enrich the country with colonial commerce and to provide, at its own expense, thirty-six war ships to serve as convoys for the merchantmen, all of which was impossible so long as the capital of the company was liable to be imperilled by sequestration and confiscation imposed on the shareholders. The inquisitor-general was ordered to have this decree filed in the secreto of the tribunals, and to enforce its observance, while João obligated himself never to revoke it.[778] The Inquisition subsequently boasted that it had excommunicated all who advised the king to this measure, and it actually succeeded in obtaining from Innocent X a brief of October 25, 1650, thanking God for what it had done and urging it to persevere.[779] Notwithstanding this, the Companhia da Bolsa was organized and, through its means, Pernambuco was recovered from the Dutch. There was flattering prospect of restoring Portuguese commerce but, when João IV died, in 1656, leaving the kingdom under the regency of his widow Lucía de Guzman, during the minority of Affonso VI, the Inquisition not only resumed confiscation but proceeded to collect the arrears since 1649. Altogether, Padre Vieira tells us, about 1680, they had gathered in up to that time some twenty-five millions, of which not more than half a million cruzados reached the royal treasury.[780] [Sidenote: _PORTUGUESE JEWS_]